Beautycounter Has Opened Its Transparent Doors in New York City

Known as the beauty brand that is fighting to kick the “toxins” out of the cosmetics industry to deliver clean beauty, Beautycounter has landed in town to help clean up your vanity.

Gregg Renfrew, Founder and C.E.O. of Beautycounter at her new store in Soho, N.Y.C.Photograph by Yvonne Tnt / BFA Image. — Gregg Renfrew, Founder and C.E.O. of Beautycounter at her new store in Soho, N.Y.C.
Photograph by Yvonne Tnt / BFA Image.

Known as the beauty brand that is fighting to kick the “toxins” out of the cosmetics industry to deliver clean beauty, Beautycounter has landed in town to help clean up your vanity.

If you know anything about the beauty industry, you know precisely who Gregg Renfrew is. If not, you might have recently read about her in The New York Times, in which she landed a full-page article about her beauty mission through her brand, Beautycounter. The purpose of banning toxic chemicals is to help regulate the management of what’s been hidden within the industry, because what goes on your face and body matters. Renfrew launched the company in the pursuit of clean health in 2013. Fast-forward to 2018, and it’s already been valued at $400 million. How? Transparency.

From the beginning, Beautycounter has attracted national attention as the first brand to take a meaningful position on cosmetic reform in makeup, skin care, and safety of products on children. According to the brand representative, through its trademarked the Never List, Beautycounter has prohibited the use of more than 1,500 questionable or harmful ingredients, well beyond the 30 required by U.S. law. Furthermore, it works extensively at the federal level to improve transparency and accountability in the industry and advocates for stronger cosmetic-safety laws, which have stood mainly unchanged since 1938. Yes, 1938! And yup, you guessed it, Renfrew is no stranger in D.C., lobbying for stricter safety standards. That is what Beautycounter is all about, beauty with a real purpose for existing. “If our mission is to get safer products into the hands of everyone, we have to be able to meet customers wherever they are shopping. We know that our story is best told person to person, and we are thrilled to add a physical retail store to the progress we’ve made in educating consumers and advocating for better beauty,” says founder and C.E.O. Gregg Renfrew.

Speaking of shopping, the new Beautycounter storefront just opened last week on 51 Prince Street in SoHo, N.Y.C., with transparent glass doors and a neon sign that reads “It’s Your Call,” pointing to a custom New York City phone booth, complete with a branded a “blue pages” phone book with the names and numbers of every member of Congress. And, they tell me, in less than a minute, customers are automatically connected and can read a script provided for lending their voices in support of the Personal Care Products Safety Act. A-mazing.

And to celebrate their first retail opening on the East Coast, Renfrew threw a grand party, inviting all family, friends, and fans of the brand. Brooke Shields, Bridget Moynahan, Jenna Lyons, and Marianna Hewitt alike were in attendance, along with the famed chef Evan Funke of Felix Los Angeles in tow, cooking the most delectable savory cuisine literally right before our eyes in an open-kitchen setting. Can you say “transparency?” One-hundred times over and then some.